


The Lonely Ghost

by gauntTwister



Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Angst, Tragedy, phicphightstuff2k19
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-27
Updated: 2019-09-27
Packaged: 2020-10-29 12:27:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20796620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gauntTwister/pseuds/gauntTwister
Summary: Full ghost Danny AU: his entire family dies in the portal accident but he is the only one who sticks around FentonWorks to haunt the house.  Eventually Sam and Tucker come in, following the rumors of a ghost haunting said house.Prompt by inky-interest (Tumblr)





	The Lonely Ghost

"Do you really think this is a good idea?" 

"Tucker," Sam sighed, "I told you all about this, remember? One year ago exactly - and we've got a full moon going for us. Our chances are as good as they're going to get." 

Tucker slumped a little. "Yeah, but it sounded a lot cooler in theory. I'm getting the creeps already just looking at the place." He turned and gave the structure before them a long stare. It had been a house once; the front door lay on the steps, having been blasted off its hinges, and scars from the fire clawed outward from the doorframe and the empty windows. An old corroded sign had been propped up against the bricks by the steps. It had lit up before the tragedy, but after a year of neglect it just read _F nt n ork._

Sam gave the charred second-story window a glance. "Tucker. That's the point. You think I'd miss the chance to see a real ghost actually manifest? C'mon." Without waiting for an answer, she grabbed his wrist and pulled him up the steps into the ruined house. 

The living room had seen better days. Most of the floorboards had broken toward the back of the room, and even the first few groaned unhappily as the trespassers made their way inside. A gutted staircase went upwards to the left, the hand railing long gone but one stumpy post of the banister standing in stubborn refusal to quit. The collapsed frame of the living-room sofa sat to the right, covered in ash and dust. The end-table hadn't fared so badly; Sam stepped carefully over to it, minding the weakened floorboards, and coaxed the drawer open with one hand. The other reached blindly out behind her. "Tucker - flashlight?" 

Tucker pulled one out of his backpack, handing it to Sam and peering over one shoulder. "Is it important?" 

Sam turned briefly back to him with a shrug. "Does it matter?" She turned the beam down into the opened drawer, rifling through its contents: an old deck of playing cards, one corner of which had burned away to ash; a little silver thing that looked like it might have, at one point, been lipstick; part of an old and disused rat's nest; a fragment of a forgotten Casper High report card. Sam held the little silver thing up and twisted the cap open. "Lime green lipstick? Score." 

"Sam," said Tucker, "You're really going to keep that?" 

"Well, yeah - it's been like two minutes and we're already finding cool junk in here. Wonder if any of this stuff is haunted? C'mon. I'm gonna check upstairs." 

Tucker hesitated. _Why did I agree to go along with this?_ He didn't like the dark, and he didn't like ghosts; he'd really rather be at home, or at the movies, or anyplace except here. He told himself to remind Sam that she owed him one for this. 

Sam turned the beam of her flashlight to the staircase. It would be tricky - especially in combat boots - but she thought she could make it up without a problem. She tiptoed carefully up the first few jutting steps, pausing to throw a glance back over her shoulder and make sure Tucker would follow her. He looked like he didn't want to, but stayed behind her anyway. She knew she'd have to make this up to him later; this had been her idea in the first place, after all, and she had a feeling that Tucker might bail later on anyway if things started to get intense. She'd stuffed her backpack with the essentials anyway - ouija board, EVP recorder, infrared camera borrowed courtesy of Tucker's dad - in the hopes that they might have some decent luck. They'd been ghosthunting more than usual lately, but hadn't found a thing in nearly a month - she'd agreed, somewhat reluctantly, to give it a break if they turned up empty again tonight. She still had her hopes up, though. 

The upstairs landing was unsteady at best. She held out one hand to keep Tucker back, crept slowly across until it felt more solid, and then gave him a nod. The beam from her flashlight had landed on the door at the near end of the hall, and she gave Tucker a little grin. "I brought that ouija board. Wanna give it a go later? See if we get anything?" 

Tucker's heart sank, but he nodded anyway. "Sure, Sam." 

Sam led him slowly into one of the bedrooms. Despite the layer of smoke and ash that had settled over every surface in the room, it was remarkably intact. The queen bed sat in one corner, and the bedside table and dresser shared the space under the window. The door of the closet hung ajar, and just for a second she swore she saw something move inside. Her eyes widened, and she jabbed Tucker with her elbow. "Hey - d'you see that?" 

"No," he whispered with a shake of his head. 

Sam crept up to the closet anyway, flashlight trained on the thin line left by the open door. She slowly nudged it open, breath held, and peered inside. She crossed her fingers - _please be a ghost please be a ghost please be a ghost_ \- but the closet was vacant. Old clothes lined the sides, and a small pile of shoes had been left in the back corner, but there were no ghosts. Sam let all her breath out in disappointment. 

"I don't think we should be here," said Tucker. Sam turned to see that he'd taken a seat on the edge of the bed, and he had both hands clamped over each other in his lap. "This place really gives me the creeps. I mean - people _died_ here, Sam. I'm pretty sure they wouldn't want us poking around - " 

Sam scoffed. "Tucker, listen. Ghosts can't actually hurt people. Besides, we haven't even seen any yet. I know I keep dragging you out on all these ghost hunts, but I swear I'll make it up to you - you know that, right? I always do." 

"Yeah," said Tucker, "That's kinda the only reason I'm still even here. Just saying." 

Sam gave him a little smile. "Thanks." 

Tucker gave her a little smile back. 

She turned back to the abandoned bedroom, the beam from her flashlight sweeping across walls and furniture alike. A forgotten jewelry display stood on one side of the dresser, and she kept the flashlight on it as she went to investigate; a modest handful of bracelets, a few pendants, and three pairs of earrings sat dully under their cover of ash and dust, and Sam pulled one of the pendants up and examined it. It was a little petunia, studded in the center by a single pink gemstone, and she scrubbed at it with the corner of her top to restore any luster that it might once have had. "Tucker - check this out. How cool is that?" 

Tucker hesitated. "I don't know, Sam - you think the ghosts'll be happy when you go and root through their stuff?" 

"It's not like they'll ever need it," Sam shrugged halfheartedly, but set the pendant back anyway. "I'm just admiring it. That's all." 

Something from the next room over clunked suddenly, making both of them jump. Sam's heart skipped a beat, and the flashlight turned immediately to the wall separating the two rooms. After a moment of silence, she turned back to Tucker; her voice was just the barest whisper. "C'mon." 

Tucker hated to go and investigate strange noises in abandoned burned-up houses, but he hated even more the thought of standing by himself in an abandoned burned-up house, and he followed Sam back into the hall. The longer they stayed, the worse he felt. Part of him still wanted to bail, but he had a feeling that Sam would take him out for a movie tomorrow - two, if things got really scary - so he stuck with her. 

The second bedroom was in much worse shape. The bed in the corner was still recognizable, but most of the furniture had been scarred by the fire. The carpet had melted and warped, solidifying afterwards in hard uneven clumps, and the feet of the dresser and bookshelf had sunk an inch into the fibers and been eaten up. About two-thirds of an old stuffed bear sat on the window - it was missing a leg and part of its body, and Sam picked it up and turned it over once in her hands. "I think her name was Jasmine," said Sam with a frown, "Maybe it was Jessamine." 

"Jasmine," said Tucker vaguely, having occupied himself with any of the titles on the bookshelf that were still readable. Most of them weren't. His foot absently found one on the floor in front of the shelf, and he picked it up. "I think this is what fell." He handed it to her. 

Sam gave the book a brief inspection. Most of the pages were charred beyond recognition, but part of the front was still readable. _Psyc- A Gui- minds of-._ The rest of the title had been destroyed. She frowned. "I vaguely remember her from school. Wasn't she a prep?" 

Tucker shrugged; he and Jasmine had never met. 

Sam tossed the destroyed book aside, peering briefly through the most-intact portions of the room. The closet was almost completely incinerated; the drywall had crumbled, taking the shelving down with it. All that remained was a pile of ashen debris on the floor, and a handful of drywall screws that jutted out from the support beams as if they might still serve any coherent purpose. Sam stepped gingerly into the space, shining the flashlight for a moment up at the ruined ceiling, but decided against it when the floorboards protested a little too loudly for her comfort. She turned back to Tucker. "You wanna try the last room on the end?" 

Tucker swallowed. "Not really," he said, following her regardless. 

Sam tiptoed back out into the hall. The weak spot on the floor was at the top of the staircase, and she skirted around the edge of it as best she could to access the last room at the end. She waved Tucker over when she was done, and turned her attention to the blackened door before them. She meant to push it open, but the frame gave out at the slightest touch; the door teetered for a second and then fell flat, sending up a cloud of ashes and dust and making them both cough. 

When the dust settled, Sam gasped. The room at the end of the hall had suffered horribly; two ends of the bedframe had collapsed, piling on each other in the middle, and the support beams holding the drywall up had been completely destroyed. The drywall itself had fallen, although it had been burned only partially. Most of the bare wooden floorboards had given out, and the remnants of the bedside table and the desk had collapsed downwards. Apart from the bedframe, and the fallen drywall, there was surprisingly little debris. Most of it, Sam guessed, had been incinerated completely. 

She swept her flashlight across the room, almost breathless. The beam flickered for a moment in the center, and just for a fraction of a second she spotted it: a translucent shadow, standing very clearly in the center of the space. She brought the light back around to fixate on it, but the shadow had vanished. Her breath hitched, and for a long moment she was silent. "Tucker," she mouthed finally, "Did you see that?" 

Tucker had, most definitely, seen it. His mouth ran dry in an instant, and frightened tears welled up in the corners of his eyes despite his best efforts. He found himself shaking his head anyway, hoping that Sam would be dissuaded and opt to call it a night, but most of him knew better. What _would_ it take for her to change her mind, he wondered. 

Sam turned the flashlight about the room again, hoping to catch another glimpse of the anomaly, but found nothing. "That's it," she decided, shoving the flashlight into Tucker's hands and sliding the backpack off her shoulders. "Infra time." 

"Sam," Tucker pleaded quietly, "Do we have to - ?" 

"Yes," Sam hissed through her teeth, "We do. That's why we came out here in the first place, remember?" She pulled the infrared camera out of her backpack, waiting for a moment as it powered up, and then kept her eyes on the screen as she turned slowly about the room. She could see Tucker's outline clearly - he lit up a pleasant red-orange - and could easily make out the few details to the room that remained. Most of it was an easier green-aqua, and when the wind swept through the empty windows she could see it swirl in a cooler blue. She turned to where she'd seen the shadow, hoping it was still there. It wasn't, but she could tell where it had been standing; two deep purple footprints were clear on the bare floorboards, their edges already falling out of crisp clarity and back toward the blue-green of the surrounding space. "Tucker, take a look at this." 

Tucker gingerly took the camera from her. He was always extra careful with things that he'd borrowed, especially if they were electronics of any sort, and turned it back to the fading footprints in the center of the room. His gut wrenched. "Sam, I really don't think we should be here - " 

"What, and miss this? Tucker, we _know_ there's a ghost here now. We're not shooting blind anymore. I bet we could even communicate with it - maybe there's more than one. Maybe all four of them are here - and how are we gonna find out about it if we don't ask?" 

Tucker was silent. _Figures Sam would be really excited about this._ He supposed he'd be excited too, if only they'd come in the daylight. 

Sam carefully plopped down on the floor, and unzipped the top of her backpack again. "You wanna try this ouija thing? I heard about it from Felicity from third-period. You met her once, right?" 

Tucker hadn't, but nodded anyway. 

Sam pulled the board out of her backpack and unfolded it so that it lay flat. "She said it works better the more people you have, but seeing as how it's just us two - I'm not sure if we're going to get anything. Worth a shot, though, right? We can always try for an EVP or two after." 

The knot of dread in Tucker's gut hardened, but he nodded anyway. 

Sam unzipped the smaller compartment of the backpack, pulling out the little wooden puck that Felicity-from-third-period had lent her along with the board. She turned it over in her hands a few times, noticing the little hole bored through the center, and then placed it down on the board. She gave Tucker an expectant look; he descended onto the floor opposite her. After a moment of hesitation, he reluctantly set his first two fingers on the side of the puck. "Sam, I really don't have a good feeling about this." 

"I know," said Sam, "Me, neither. Tell you what, though - stick with me until the end and I'll take you tomorrow night for a double feature." 

Tucker weighed the offer in his mind briefly, but then nodded. "Yeah." 

Sam took a deep breath, turning her attention back to the puck under her fingers. "You think it'll answer?" 

She had meant it as a somewhat rhetorical question to Tucker, but almost immediately the puck slid anyway: _YES._

Sam's eyes widened. "Tucker - " 

"Real funny, Sam," said Tucker, shifting uncomfortably in place. 

"That wasn't me," she whispered, holding his stare. She glanced for just a second back down at the board, and gave him an excited smile. "I knew we'd be able to communicate." 

Tucker pulled his hand away and wrapped both his arms around his knees. "I really don't like this." 

"Tucker, come on," Sam pressed, "It won't work if we're not both - " 

The puck slid out from under her fingers, skittering off the board and coming to a halt at the edge of one of the charred floorboards. After a pause, it turned slowly to point at her. 

Sam was silent, and she gave Tucker a wide-eyed look. After a moment, she slowly reached over to retrieve the puck, careful not to disturb the uneven floorboards more than she had to. She hated to reach out that far - she could feel them tipping slightly under her weight - and she brushed against the thing with her fingers, grabbed it, and pulled it back to the sturdier part where she and Tucker were sitting. She held it for a moment, running one thumb along its edge, and then set it back on the board. _Maybe Felicity-from-third-period was wrong,_ she thought with a little frown. _Maybe we don't need to be touching it at all._ "I'm gonna try something." 

"Don't," said Tucker, but made no move to stop her. 

Sam stared down at the puck, a determined frown on her face, and then asked quietly, "Are you the only spirit here with us tonight?" 

There was a long silence as nothing happened. Sam was almost about to reach out and touch it again, but the puck slid slowly over: _YES._

Sam could hardly believe it. After all the places around town they'd swept with Tucker's dad's infra, and all the empty EVP sessions even when they were certain they'd find results, the husk of FentonWorks had been there the whole time. She turned to Tucker. "You wanna ask it anything?" 

Tucker shook his head. His voice was tight and pinched. "I wanna go home." 

Sam turned back down to the board before her. The puck still rested over _YES_ as if it hadn't moved at all. She kept her voice a whisper, but could hardly contain her excitement. "Do you mean us harm?" 

Again, the puck was still for a moment, but this time it slid faster: _I DON'T KNOW._

Sam frowned. "You don't know?" She thought to herself for a moment, and almost missed the first movement of the puck as it crawled across the board again. The letters read clearly: _THIEF._ As if to make a point, it rested on _F_ for a moment before rotating to indicate Sam's backpack. 

Sam's eyes followed its direction, and she frowned. Remembering the lipstick, she dug it out of the backpack and held it up. Sure enough, the pointing end of the puck followed it like the needle of a compass, and only sat still when she set it down over by the charred doorframe. 

"Told you you should have left it alone," said Tucker quietly. 

Sam shot him a look. "Shut up." She repositioned herself, turned back to the board, and asked: "What's your name, spirit?" 

The puck was still. Sam stared down expectantly, but it didn't seem to want to budge. She and Tucker exchanged glances; after a tense silence, she whispered, "You think it's gone?" 

"No way," Tucker shook his head, "You feel how cold it got all of a sudden?" 

Sam paused. The infrared camera had been left at Tucker's side, and she grabbed it again. It wasn't just him; the green-aqua of the room had shifted to a light blue to indicate the drop in temperature. She turned it about the room once, hoping to locate the mysterious spirit, and found only a fading wisp of blue-purple over the floorboards. She thought for a moment before scooting carefully to the edge of the boards and peering downwards. The camera, unfortunately, didn't pick up much through the darkness below. "You think it lives down there?" 

Tucker had no comment. 

Sam glanced over her shoulder at him. "You wanna go down and find out?" 

She heard the puck snap loudly against the board, and she and Tucker both jumped. She turned, scrambling back from the edge of the dark hole, and set the camera down on the floor by her backpack. She refused to say anything about it, but her mouth went dry in that moment, and all of a sudden she was aware of just how cold it had gotten. She glanced down; the puck rested firmly on the board: _NO._

Tucker had frozen up. He'd pulled his hat down over his ears and turned away from the board, hoping that perhaps the spirit might leave him alone then, but he knew it wouldn't help. He gave up, and instead looked helplessly over at Sam. "Can we _please_ go home?" 

Sam hesitated. Her eyes remained affixed to the puck on the board before her. Part of her wanted to listen to Tucker and call it a night; _no,_ she told herself, _we came out here to see ghosts, and we're finally seeing them._ It was just because she'd never actually talked to one before - that's why she was jumpy. That must have been it. She gave herself a little nod, as if the matter was settled, and turned back to the board. The puck remained still - what had she said? She'd asked Tucker if he'd wanted to take a look down the hole and see what they'd find. She guessed they'd end up in the kitchen downstairs - she'd seen it when they'd come in, although they hadn't investigated it yet - but the spirit, apparently, was against the notion. Well, she reasoned, they didn't really belong here. If anyone did, it was the ghost. She asked quietly, "Why are you with us, spirit?" 

The puck slid partway across the board, paused for a moment, and then backtracked: _I DON'T KNOW._

Tucker stiffened. "Sam," he whispered, as if somehow the entity wouldn't overhear him if he was quiet enough, "You think it even knows it's dead - ?" 

The puck on the board was moving again. _YES._

A spike of fear pierced him. Dread had hung over him since he and Sam had stepped foot in the remains of the house, and had grown into a knot in his gut when she'd pulled the ouija board out; seeing the spirit respond directly to him was almost too much. He turned to Sam again, his voice high. "What does it want - tell it to go away - " 

Sam gave him a disapproving look. "Tucker," she said slowly, voicing her thought process as it was happening, "Oh my god, it knows it's a ghost. It's self-aware - hey, wait a second." She leaned over the board a little. "What if it really doesn't know why it's here? What if it needs our help to move on?" 

_"Move on?"_ Tucker echoed, "Sam, this is serious - !" 

"I am serious!" Sam snapped, crossing her arms, "Go and sit in the hall, then. I'm gonna keep talking to it." 

"Split up? Are you out of your mind? That's what gets us both killed - !" 

"Stop it," Sam hissed through her teeth, trying her best to sound demanding in the hopes that it would mask her uncertainty. Despite what she kept telling herself, part of her did believe Tucker; spirits were dangerous, and the only thing worse than provoking one and making it angry was finding out that it had followed her home and made itself comfortable. Although it took some effort, she managed to keep her breaths steady. _This was your idea, you know. You said it would be fun._ Despite her doubts, though, she was determined to see it through. That, and Tucker wouldn't let her hear the end of it if she changed her mind now. She settled back on her haunches again, keeping Tucker's eyes. "Are you bailing or not?" 

Tucker hesitated. Most of him really wanted to, but he knew he couldn't leave Sam by herself. "Not." 

"That's what I thought," she whispered. Relief swept over her; she had fully expected him to leave her on her own, and she wondered briefly whether she would have stayed if he had. Despite the fact that Tucker was scared of a great many things, it was still better to have him around. Her attention turned back to the board. Her flashlight, plopped on top of her backpack, had kept it lit so that they could see. "What d'you think we should ask it?" 

Tucker fidgeted. "I don't know, man." 

"Thanks. Love your input." 

Tucker thought for a moment. "Ask it what it wants. Maybe we'll get lucky and it won't say it's gonna murder us for coming into its house." 

"You know it can hear you say that, right?" said Sam, "Why don't you ask it that yourself?" 

Tucker didn't. 

Sam scoffed, but looked back down at the board anyway. "Spirit," she paused, knowing there was a more proper way she was supposed to ask things (according to Felicity-from-third-period, anyhow), "Is there something keeping you tethered here - something you're still looking for?" 

There was a long silence before the faint scraping of the puck across the board. It got as far as _ALO-_ before it skittered off the board completely. Sam caught it before it could disappear through the gaps in the floorboards or down into the ruined kitchen, and set it back on the board. After a moment, it tried again: _LONELY._

"Tucker," Sam whispered, wide eyes fixed on the puck, "I wonder if it's the only one still around?" 

"You mean only one ghost instead of a whole family of them? Yeah, that makes me feel so much better." 

The puck was still moving: _FOLLOW._ Sam opened her mouth to question what it meant, but the puck came suddenly upwards, hanging for a moment in the air. It set itself down in the palm of her hand at the same instant that she was wracked by an uncontrollable shiver; the sensation passed, but the puck in her hand was like ice. It turned slowly on her palm to point down the hall. 

"Tucker," she breathed, "Did you see that?" 

He nodded. "That's not good, man." 

Sam got slowly up to her feet, keeping her movements slow and even. Her hands had finally quit trembling; her fingers had gone mostly numb, but it hardly registered. She followed the direction she was given, and peered out into the hall. 

"Sam - hey, wait!" Tucker scrambled after her, shoving the infra back into her backpack and tucking the board under one arm. He paused at the top of the stairs; she was already partway down, careful not to touch anything that might give way under her. He propped the flashlight briefly in the corner of his neck so that he had his hands free to sling the backpack over one shoulder, and went down after her. He caught up to her at the landing, the flashlight in his hand surprisingly steady. 

Sam turned to him, and he swore he caught a glint of green in her eye. "Gimme that," she took the flashlight from him, and turned it about the room. The wall separating the living-room from the kitchen was in a sorry state. The shapes of flames that had overtaken it were still visible, outlined in charcoal-black, and part of it had crumbled completely. Her footsteps were careful, but under the empty doorframe on the far side was where the floor gave out completely. This did not stop her from coming all the way up to the edge and peering down into the hole. She glanced down at the puck, which was still in her hand; it pointed ahead. 

The flashlight illuminated, a little at a time, the space below. There was - at least, there had been at one point - a basement down there. It was littered with charred furniture and debris; burned beams and plaster had collapsed from the level above, and anything that might otherwise have survived the fire was crushed. The remains of two metal work-tables jutted out from under the debris in the corner of the room. The metal walls had bowed outwards, and the near end where there had once been stairs was now a mangled wreck. "Tucker," she whispered, "I think this is where it started." 

Tucker peered over her shoulder. "You're not seriously gonna go down there. Please tell me you're not - " 

Sam turned to him. "Why not? There's no way we're not getting better results down there - " 

"Because, Sam!" Tucker exclaimed, "Hello! Scary basement in a house you already know is haunted? Don't you think that's got bad idea written all over it? I know how this works! That's where you go to _die!"_

"It can't be that bad - " 

"Don't say it! Don't! Even! Say it! That's bull and you know it!" Tucker grabbed her wrist, taking a step back toward the front door. "Come on, Sam, _please_ let's just go home, I promise we'll be alive for so much longer - " 

"Tucker, quit it!" Sam snapped. She yanked herself free of him, taking one step back in an effort to counterbalance herself. The floorboard splintered underneath her; she toppled back, landing with a hard thud on the cold floor of the basement and momentarily losing her focus. She stood, shaking the dizziness out of her head, and glanced around for the flashlight. It had come to rest on a fallen pile of burned debris and gone out, and she gave it a few smacks with the heel of her hand in the hopes it would light up again. It didn't. 

"Sam?" came Tucker's voice from above. She looked up; she could make out his outline against the opening of the stairs, but the stairs themselves were gone. "Sam, are you okay?" 

"Yeah," she called back, "I'm good." 

"I told you we should have gone home." 

Sam sighed. "Look, I'm gonna see if I can find a big box or something I can climb on to get back up. Just hold still for a sec, would you?" 

She thought she heard him grumble something along the lines of _I bet you'll stay down there as long as you want_ but ignored it. She turned to the wreck of the basement with a shiver - it was much colder down here than it had been upstairs - but she was unable to make out many details in the dark. The only thing that she could see for sure was some big shadowy thing on the far end of the room - she guessed it was mounted to the wall, and she didn't give it another thought until the little red light at the top blinked to life. 

She paused, her heart beginning to race. _What was that?_ There couldn't possibly still be power here, could there? The little red light indicated otherwise. She watched, silent, as the thing on the wall groaned. Two massive metal plates began to part before her, screeching from a year of neglect, and an unearthly mist crawled from behind them. It settled in pools between piles of rubble, and a swirl of unfathomable energy cast a ghastly green light across the space. 

Sam's breath caught in her chest. She knew she was trembling, and not just from the sudden cold - despite herself, she couldn't take her eyes away from the crooked circle of light. In the near-complete darkness, it was almost blinding, and she brought one hand up over her eyes to shield herself. 

"Sam? What's going on down there?" came Tucker's voice, but it seemed distant. A second later, he came down after her; she hardly noticed. "Sam - ?" 

Sam carefully crept closer. She traced the outline of the portal with her gaze; she could feel the energy that wafted from it, and her skin broke out in goosebumps. The metal frame of the thing was completely intact, almost as if there hadn't been a fire at all, and another piece clicked into place in her mind. "Tucker," she whispered, only daring to glance over at him for an instant, "This is it. This is what caused it." 

Tucker couldn't seem to take his eyes off the thing either, but remained silent. 

The off-lime glow began to dim slowly, and Sam and Tucker both took a step back. Puffs of concentrated energy swirled together in the center, taking shape; it was the shadow that Sam had caught in the beam of her flashlight earlier, floating almost in the center of the room. Its strength was fuller here, and it was able to manifest more clearly: its hands and feet faded from blackened shadow to foggy white wisps, and its eyes began to glow a softer green. It kept its head low, as if afraid to look at them directly. 

Sam was the first to take a step forward. Her heart was pounding but her mind had all but ground to a halt - _an actual for-real ghost!_ \- and she had gone almost completely numb. She kept her eyes on the apparition, certain that it would vanish if she looked away for even an instant, and one hand slowly came out to see if she could touch it. 

The spirit flinched, floating back from her for a moment, but then paused. It regarded her, unblinking, and one of its hands hesitantly came out to meet hers. It spoke not aloud but as an echo in her mind: _(lonely)_

She brushed its fingertips with hers. Only then did she begin to process again, and she blinked a few times in an effort to keep her thoughts from scattering in all directions at once. "I. . ." What could she even have said? What did she really want to tell it? There weren't any answers for that, and she let herself go quiet again. 

The spirit floated lower, holding its shape but declining to solidify into a solid mass. Its touch was like ice, but it held its fingers against hers. It finally met her gaze. _(scared?)_

Sam realized slowly that its question was directed at her. Her mouth had run dry, and so she just nodded slowly. 

_(Me too)_

"Sam," Tucker whispered, "We really shouldn't be here - " 

_(Don't go)_

Sam turned slowly. "Don't you get it," she said hoarsely, almost unable to speak at all. She turned back to the ghost so that Tucker wouldn't see the tears forming in the corners of her eyes. "He's been stuck down here this whole time. He's the _only_ one stuck down here. I can't even imagine. . ." 

The spirit reached out a little further, taking Sam's hand. Its touch was careful, as if it was afraid it might hurt her, and it drifted slowly downwards to be level with her. 

Sam swiped at the tears with the back of her other hand. "You've been by yourself down here since you died, haven't you?" 

_(Yes)_

Something in her stomach twinged. She couldn't bear to think of it - being caught in some disaster, losing everything and everyone, and being forced to stay behind and wander the little that's left - it made her sick. "I'm so sorry. . ." 

The spirit swayed a little in place. _(Please stay)_

Sam found herself nodding before she had even thought about it. "Of course we'll stay - " (we? Tucker asked from behind her) " - you don't have anyone to talk to anymore - you poor ghost, you must be heartbroken - " 

_(A little)_

Tucker shifted in place. Part of him still wanted to leave this whole house behind, but he knew that wasn't going to happen anytime soon. He admitted to himself, somewhat reluctantly, that he'd probably be miserable too if anything like that had happened to him. Maybe he wasn't going to turn his back on the spirit, but for the moment he'd keep his mouth shut. 

Sam still had the spirit's hand. The cold had faded; an electric pins-and-needles sensation was in its place, and she did her best to ignore it. She glanced briefly back at Tucker, as if she'd needed his permission for anything they'd done that night, and asked: "Did you still want to go?" 

Tucker shuffled his feet. "I guess not." 

She turned back to the spirit before her. "We can't stay too long - but I promise we'll be back tomorrow. Soon as the sun goes down. We can talk then, right?" 

_(I'll still be here)_

Sam gave the apparition a little nod. She could still hardly believe it - she'd just made friends with an actual ghost! She took a deep breath, and asked quietly: "You have a name, ghost? Mine's Sam." 

The spirit's glowing green eyes turned slightly upwards. _(Mine's Danny. I'll see you tomorrow)_ and just like that he vanished as the portal behind him powered down.


End file.
